Many types of manned aircraft, in particular manned military aircraft, have a communications management capability where some of the following functionality is provided on the aircraft):                (i) separating “unencrypted protectively marked data” (known as, and herein referred to as, “red data”) and “encrypted protectively marked data and/or not-protectively marked data” (known as, and herein referred to as, “black data”);        (ii) being able to use a “red” system to command “black” communications equipment;        (iii) providing a level of autonomy in communications management; and        (iv) providing the ability to configure communication pathways through the system in order that the specific route that data (i.e. datagrams) take from source to destination is pre-defined.        
Conventionally, UAVs are not provided with secure communications management capability.